Japanese roasted green tea, hojicha, reviewed and researched

I'm reviewing a roasted green tea from Japan, which will involve describing the tea, and also considerable research into what that is.  At first it seemed it would be partially oxidized tea, so essentially oolong, but based on a comment from a tea expert that probably isn't right (Michael Coffey).  He said the tea wasn't oxidized but instead converted by a different type of reaction, the Maillard reaction, which he described as the change that browns toast (which I also thought related to the seared coating on steak).  Wikipedia can clear that part up, but describing the tea in more detail will also take some research.

It goes without saying, implied in the context of the writing, but in most cases these posts are more about sharing my "journey to tea" than describing really unusual teas, or as an authoritative reference, and so on.  Some of the teas are exceptional types, and some exceptional examples of a type, but generally I wouldn't try to specify that, more just talk about the teas.

This tea I'm writing about seems a conventional type, although an example that perhaps few people "outside the world of tea" would have got around to trying.  It wouldn't be new to most tea enthusiasts, and would almost surely seem quite common in Japan.

unconventional looking; still cool

Review part:

should say hojicha?

The tea is nice.  It is just tea but the processing gives it a grain-like taste, perhaps most like toasted sesame, maybe a little like a fresh home-made loaf of wheat bread would taste (I can't remember ever having that though; my Mom only used white flour, but after this tea I'd like to try it).


So it's nothing like green tea; no astringency, very soft, not grassy or vegetal, with a rich, full flavor, a bit sweet, maybe even towards caramel.  And not really like black tea or oolong, different than those ranges of flavors.  So new to me, just great!  Except I bought and tried another similar tea in Japan recently, almost certainly the same type, but still new enough.

still not informative to me

It would seem to work well as an everyday tea; not so exceptional I'd keep seeking out slight variations on the type, but good in a way that I don't think I'd get tired of it.  Of course this is based on trying one such tea (ok, two; not different, especially since the other was an inexpensive tea I picked up in passing).  Different versions could shine in some different ways, or I guess someone else could get really caught up in the flavor profile.


It almost reminds me of genmaicha, the Japanese tea that blends roasted rice with green tea.  I suppose in addition to the grain-like flavor profile there is a hint of fresh vegetable flavor below that, slightly towards seaweed, but in a good sense.



It's a bit of a tangent but seaweed really could get a bad name it doesn't deserve, of course; it's a broad range of plants, not just one.  I don't love most of those plants or most of the ways they are prepared but once you get past the unfamiliarity and texture a lot of them are nice, just not my favorite.  Of course it works great with sushi, and there's no other decent vehicle for consuming wasabe, at least that I've tried.

Hawaiians love seaweed mixed with raw tuna (poke); not so much for me.  Koreans, and I suppose Japanese, love dried sheets of processed seaweed as a snack, salted or flavored, and those are nice.  Japanese ramen often comes with similar sheets that integrate really well with the other rich flavors, nice with pork stock broths, or for me even better with a miso base added.  Now this really is a tangent.

Related to tea I favor more oxidized versions so I'm on the opposite page but green teas have a fresh taste they can't match.  I suppose to be honest I like longjing best because it has a slightly less grassy, vegetable range profile, closer to toasted rice, grain, or nuts, so this tea works well with my natural preference.  It turns out the processing steps aren't so different.

Type of tea: research section

I've read of this tea type recently in summaries of types being sold in Japan, and when doing online research (I think).  Of course Wikipedia content matches all the following research turns up, but since that article is a subset of "green tea" Japanese black tea falls by the wayside (wakoucha / kocha; the tea I reviewed last).

Per Google's first reference suggestion (thefragrantleaf.com/guide-to-japanese-teas):

the degree of roastiness in the aroma and flavor will depend on whether the tea is lightly or more deeply roasted... Lower in caffeine, it makes a great after-dinner tea. 


So there's that; maybe drinking tea in the evenings is one way I could work on the growing stock-pile at home.  I'm still not seeing how that's different than an oolong though.

A bit of a different subject, but related to the main Japanese green tea type the reference also said:

sencha can be translated as "roasted tea". This term refers to an older style of processing Japanese green tea that was influenced by Chinese tea processing methods. Today, most sencha is steamed instead of pan-roasted in its initial stage to prevent oxidation of the leaf.


A second general reference (japan-guide.com) sheds no more light on these types, but does refer to Japanese black tea as "kocha," not wakoucha, which seems a variant, and adds:
 
Oolongcha (a type of Chinese tea):  Oolongcha involves allowing the tea leaves to oxidize, and then steaming or roasting them to stop the oxidization process. 


On the first read I thought now I've got to go back to Japan to try their version of oolong but this seems to actually just refer to Chinese tea.  Chinese oolongs are nice (pretty much my favorite), and they were selling them in different places in Japan, along with lots of other types of teas.

hojicha would've been nice

Yet another summary reference didn't add much, except that the tea is roasted by pan-frying, and also the point "this tea is usually the first tea that Japanese babies drink."  Too late since my baby has tried a few types already, but I will certainly introduce her to it, and I'm sure it will suit her palate.  Now I just need to teach her to talk so she can describe her preferences and general flavor profiles.


I'm still not getting to processing details for this tea:  a better blog reference from Ricardo Caicedo starts into more detail at least:  myjapanesegreentea.com/houjicha.  It add lots more depth, including brewing instructions, and a video on how the tea is roasted, and a link to how to try that at home (cool enough!), along with background:


Houjicha is most commonly made with bancha, although it is also made with sencha and kukicha as well. The basic process consists of roasting the loose leaves at about 200 degrees celcius, followed by a quick cooling.

This process lowers the catechin and caffeine content of the leaves. Why is this important? Because the catechin is the main source of astringency and caffeine an important source of bitterness in the tea. 


A different blog post discussed re-roasting teas, not exactly related, but this might sound familiar, as a way to refresh the flavors of a pan-fried type of tea.  While I'm digressing, comments about how to make masala chai in recent discussion covered how roasting those other ingredients changes and heightens their flavors when making that type of spice and tea blend.  My blog post on this subject didn't cover that technique, but a comment did, and the technique used by my Korean tea guru did (I'll have to figure out a way to get her to guest post about something as an introduction).


Another reference claims the tea is oxidized, along with this interesting point "because Hojicha is roasted, with a lengthier oxidation it converts the catechins into compounds called theaflavins and thearubigins."  Good to know, but that won't stick.  It seems possible "oxidized" isn't really the right concept.


A redit page includes a lot of general background on different teas, and makes the point that this tea type (hojicha) includes stems as a component that provides a particular flavor, whereas in most other teas including stems is a sign of lower quality tea.  That's starting on a separate subject I've often considered, the impact of stems on the taste of tea.  It always seemed it wouldn't necessarily just be negative, that the stem included could compliment leaf flavor elements, but I've not made any ground on that line of thought.  The "common tea myths" section by Michael Coffey in that reference is worth a read but not related.

Conclusions

This never did get around to completely settling the difference between oxidation and the later roasting process changes in this tea.  It was interesting to read through tea processing references, and some did go into how this tea is made (with further reading out there; seemed like a lot of links to keep adding them all), but apparently it's just pan roasted after normal green tea production.

The Maillard reaction reference is a start but doesn't clarify things either, really:  per the Wikipedia article:

The reaction is a form of nonenzymatic browning which typically proceeds rapidly from around 140 to 165 °C (284 to 329 °F)...  The reactive carbonyl group of the sugar reacts with the nucleophilic amino group of the amino acid, and forms a complex mixture of poorly characterized molecules responsible for a range of odors and flavors.

here it is, tea processing summarized!  and no oxidation.  graphic credit doesn't fit here.

Tea processing graphic credit:  by Sjschen (Own work) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)], via Wikimedia Commons


So there's that.  The process corresponding to roasting (pan frying) this tea is related to browning toast, searing steak, that crust on pretzels, and malted barley, but not oxidation.  It does create a nice, distinctive tea in this case.

Review of Japanese black tea (wakoucha)

I tried the black tea I bought in Japan recently.  I wish I could say it was an interesting and positive presentation of a black tea style, but I didn't like it.

Usually it's not so simple; teas have a complex character, and some aspects are positive, others negative, and it's more about appreciating aspects and then noting how it matches overall preferences.  This tea had a strange flavor element that I didn't care for.

looks like tea (maybe a little choppy)

tea label (black tea?)

That taste element reminded me of gaba teas I've tried in the past:  nitrogen-environment processed teas, designed to result in production of a brain function regulating component compound (with the shortened name "gaba").  Maybe such a tea calms you, or possibly it doesn't, with more on the flavor and effectiveness in my earlier research and review post.  You might wonder, why would exposure to nitrogen affect a tea, because it's the main component in air anyway?  Good question.  My understanding, as conveyed by a tea guru, is that the lack of nitrogen forces reactions that would normally be based on oxygen to occur with nitrogen instead, so the tea would be less "oxidized," even though something similar but different would still happen.

It's worth noting that I've only tried such teas produced in Taiwan but the processing was developed in Japan, and it's my understanding that most such are consumed in Japan, perhaps even of those produced in Taiwan, so I don't know for sure that there wasn't some type relation.

But onto a review of this tea.

Review

A general maltiness came across first, and a fraction of a second later that taste element that I'd spoken of.  It's hard to describe; a bit like cardboard or chalk, a mustiness, maybe leaning a little towards wet dirty sock.  In some gaba teas a similar taste tied to a dry feel to the teas, and maybe a little here, but less so.

It was hard to get past that flavor element to evaluate the rest of the tea character.  It didn't have a lot of astringency, and was a little malty, a bit earthy, and if somehow that one taste could be removed it might have balanced into a nice tea.  With it--I'm not sure what I'll do with the tea.  More guesses on what it tasted like:  cork, but not a fresh and light cork similar to balsawood, which would be nicer, or a little like that smell of old books in a library.  I love that smell but wouldn't love it as a flavor in tea.


I almost have to compare the tea to a black tea I just bought in Korea and recently posted about, although the two teas are quite different.  That one lacked an objectionable flavor component, and so seemed superior.  Attributes that weren't as positive as in my favorite teas stood out in the Korean tea, so it was interesting but wouldn't be a favorite.  In both cases I couldn't help but think drinking green teas instead might make more sense, reminded of the expression "when in Rome do as the Romans do."

But I'd been through the opposite experience in Vietnam half a year ago.  I tried a lot of consistently good, distinctive green teas--what they typically drink--and also tried two very nice black teas, and one very good darker oolong, and one nice lighter oolong.  These were interesting not just because they were good but also because they were different than others I'd tried before, as with lots of types of teas I tried from lots of different places.

could be clearer (same for the website)

I could say more about the tea based on reading up on it on a vendor website (the package referenced one:  http://www.mikuniyazengoro.com/).  But that site is only in Japanese.  They also have a Facebook page (page linked here) but it's also only in Japanese, or at least mostly Japanese, since there at least some section heading titles are in English.


Ordinarily if I really didn't like a tea it would be as well to just not write about that particular tea (if you can't say anything nice...), especially given I'm not completely sure what I've bought.  In some other cases I've passed label photos onto foreign friends for translation, but didn't this time, so I've no idea what that site would've told me about that tea, or related product options.


In this case I'm posting all this because it's part of a larger search for teas I've already been discussing, and even a relatively negative result is part of that process.  I'm completely sure this one tea doesn't indicate anything general about the rest of that vendor's teas, and I wouldn't be surprised if there are considerations I'm not taking into account, like it's not really supposed to be equivalent in style to many other black teas I've tried.

Other considerations

Somehow it softened the blow that this tea wasn't sold as a premium tea, that the cost was at least in the normal range (around $10 for 60 grams, versus around $30 for 40 grams for the Korean black tea--not normal, for me).  It wasn't just the expense at stake; it seemed to make a difference how the tea was represented, as much as packaging type and foreign language text did such a thing.  Staff in both tea shops could barely speak English, so hardly offered any input or opinion on the teas.  In Korea the shop had been selling one significantly more expensive black tea--the one that I bought--and one relatively inexpensive one (at a more typical pricing level, likely roughly similar to this tea), so if I'd hated that tea, or if it seemed flawed, it would seem a different thing.

Of course my wife is concerned with how much money I waste on teas, but no need to get into that (it's not much; nothing like a Starbucks habit or bar spending).

To compare further and provide some context, I bought two lower range Chinese teas in a tea shop in Chinatown in Yokohama.  I was there to find Japanese teas, and only there realized they'd probably not sell much in the way of Japanese teas (after they said they didn't), because it was Chinatown.


I've tried two of the four teas, one sold as Wuyi Yancha (more oxidized oolong), the other as shou or cooked pu'er (or at least as compressed tea; labeling wasn't in English, so likely not from the right region for pu'er).  I didn't keep close track of cost for these but it was low; around $20 for a two or three hundred grams of tea.  Both teas I tried didn't seem to be high quality level teas but I liked both more than the two black teas I'm discussing here, in part related to preferring those general types, and also because they were decent teas.  I won't mind drinking them, and wouldn't have reservations about sharing it.


It was interesting they were calling black tea "red" in that shop in Chinatown, and referring to compressed teas as black.  This seemed to come from Chinese terminology, of course, and also helped explain why I might have never found a Japanese black tea without using a different Japanese name (wakoucha).

It's not possible to judge a general tea type by one tea product, so I really can't say much about either Japanese or Korean black teas in general.  As luck had it the two Vietnamese black teas I tried were both quite good, so evidence mounts that there is a generality there, but surely I could have tried two much worse teas based on having less luck.

A comment made on a Japanese black tea blog post (here) referenced another more experienced tea blogger having tried several such teas, and this is how more informed perspectives are developed, over time, based on more sampling.  Of course sourcing is also relevant.  If I'd instead tried a tea a vendor had provided based on trying many such teas and selecting a favorite that would seem a better representative than allowing random chance to lead to only one.

A very limited selection process applied to the Korean black tea; the shop presented two options and identified one as better, potentially based on cost more than the product qualities, although often the two go together.  There also seems a chance that just because the tea was sold as such and was expensive that it still wasn't a great representative of the general type.

Korean tea

It can be misleading to judge by appearance but that Korean tea did include a good bit of stem and the leaves weren't whole, so it seemed at least possible it could have been sorted as that tea product and also as a higher grade.  But who knows.


The Japanese black tea consisted of shredded leaves, typical of machine-processed tea (but again who knows; an informed tea expert might extrapolate from the final-product evidence more effectively).  I tried a machine-processed Cambodian black tea once that didn't look like much but was nice (that I wrote about here), which was nearly given away for free compared to all of these teas.


In conclusion, you really can't conclude much from trying one tea, but I didn't like this one.

Travel and tea in Japan, versus Korea

I've recently visited both Japan and Korea, with this post covering travel and especially a tea search in Japan.  I didn't do that search justice given places like Disneyland were a higher priority but I still managed to come across a few interesting teas.

It seems as well to start with general impressions.  People tend to ask which country I liked better, and how the two countries differ.  Of course it really doesn't work to summarize the second; the two places and cultures are far too diverse to really compare in that way.  But still the questions are valid, so I'll make a start.

sakura in Yokoham, Japa

sakura and other blooming trees in Seoul, Korea

To me nowhere in Asia looks like Japan; it's the only fully developed country in Asia in the same sense America and Europe are completely modern.  You can even drink the tap water (take that Europe!).  Korea is not far behind, even ahead in some ways, like internet infrastructure and speed.  It's not as if there are things you can't find in Korea that they have elsewhere (ok, possibly some Japanese things, but it's pretty much all there).

giant Buddha

Aside from that Japan has its own style, something impossible to describe, so that buildings and designed areas have a great look and feel (of course the gardens are unique; I mean everything else), and even nature as well.


I noticed something similar in Bavaria, German, where the country was so tidy that even the woods you could see from roads were a bit landscaped (not seemed so, they were).  But Japan takes it to another level.  Cities have a carefully planned style, even nature does, clothing, etc.

amazing miso ramen

Food is taken to another level in Japan.  Even here in Thailand where Japanese food is popular you can't compare what you can find of it here to there.


A hole in the wall ramen shop near where we stayed served the best ramen and the best gyoza I've tasted (fried dumplings), and we've tried versions from dozens of restaurants between Hawaii--which has more Japanese residents than "white"--or Bangkok, which also has a significant Japanese population.



I keep having the experience of a food not really making sense to me until I try a great version.  This happened on a trip to Japan two years ago related to Japanese food, and especially buckwheat noodles (and related to Korean barbecue and kimchi as a condiment a bit over a week ago, but that's a different story).


Of course people are asking me about the culture and the people more than level of development or landscaping or architecture.  A lot of them are now huge fans of Korea because of K-pop (music) or Korean drama.  Of course those exports don't really relate to how one would interact with the average person in Korea, which is more relevant to a visitor.


Japanese people seemed a bit reserved, so it stood out moving on to Korea when people again started commenting on how cute our one-year-old daughter is (essentially like a doll-baby come to life, really).  But then being a bit quieter isn't so negative, and we ended up in some relatively populated places, which would tend to result in people keeping to themselves more.

happier than most commuters

My son's favorite part of the vacation was the trains in both countries, and the rail system in Japan is more developed and extensive than anything I've seen, sort of the opposite of the US.  Then again the rail system around Seoul is fairly complete too, which was all we needed to use on this trip.  In Japan it's different though, lots of different networks, different types of trains, local and express versions to go everywhere, high speed trains, customized luxury touring trains, on and on.

one of many local train networks; in any other country this would be all of it

 English language use is helpful for us when travelling, and it's not so common in either country.  At least in Korea signs were converted to English, which helped a lot, but in both places down to the last person every by-stander we asked for instructions went way out of their way to help us.

For a typical traveler books like Lonely Planet would cover a lot of step-by-step directions anyway, and use of tourist SIMs (phone cards) and Google Maps could help a lot with pointing the way.

Tea in Japan

Maps knows!  some, at least.

I'd hoped that tea would be so prevalent that it would be easy to find in Japan, and didn't do a lot of prior research about it.  Of course it was common, and I did eventually stumble across some less common teas I'd hoped to find, like Japanese black tea.


Given the limited use of English I wasn't sure Google Maps could identify tea shops (as in Thailand business names aren't always identified in English wording) but it did turn up many.  Cafes--places to get a cup of tea, not bulk loose teas--tend to mix with other shops, so it would be nice to get input ahead of time of just the right place, not so easy to do.


I tried finding tea in Chinatown in Yokohama (which of course worked), and only there it occurred to me they would only sell Chinese teas.  Of course I'm not basing that on visiting a lot of shops; given conflicting time demands I was only in and out of a few places.  So I bought four Chinese teas there instead--strange, but based on trying two so far great value for decent, inexpensive teas.

tea shop in Chinatown

Grocery stores sell tea, of course, but in any country there's the concern that they are usually relatively low grades of tea.  In Japan the language issue made it more confusing; with packaging written only in Japanese I'd be buying it almost completely at random.


I did buy a package of "roasted green tea" in one based on getting help from the staff.  I'll research what that means and add more on it in a separate review post.  It was interesting that most seemed to sell teas from other countries as well; nice they could show such diverse tea appreciation, given the range and quality of their domestic products.


I finally found Japanese black tea in a specialty tea shop, the second such shop I found (essentially just on the way to other places, so the plan to invoke luck sort of worked).  The first shop had sold relatively little Japanese tea, focusing more on sales of teas from other countries.  I never would have found it if I hadn't known the Japanese name for black tea (wakoucha; more background on that here).  It was interesting they seemed to be calling black tea "red" tea (from the Chinese convention, of course), so along with the rest of the language issues asking for Japanese black tea might not ever have worked.


Ordinarily when someone would write about tea in Japan they'd move straight into numerous types of teas Japan is famous for, essentially variations of green tea (for the most part, but of course it's not that simple).  I started on drinking loose tea in the form Japanese green teas years ago (maybe four or five?), but only started going overboard with research and tasting in the last two years, so I never did really completely know what I was drinking.  And I still haven't circled back to that, although I expect to eventually.

To make a long story short I've since preferred Chinese teas, especially more oxidized oolongs and black teas, and tried others from lots of other countries.  To stick to more familiar scope and still try something different I wanted to find Japanese black tea, which did work out.  Japanese grocery stores in Bangkok stock an entire aisle of green teas so really I wouldn't need to get on a plane to get back to basics, when I get around to it.  Of course that assumes that Japanese people could somehow counter the curse of almost all grocery store tea being awful.  After seeing the miracle of their rail system I'd think they might be able to, or maybe it's still asking too much.

Conclusions about Japanese teas

fascinated, and not thinking about tea

I never will be able to settle on objective conclusions based on my limited experience, but even limited findings will need to wait until I actually taste the teas I bought.  I've only been back a few days and I was too busy for tea tasting in Japan and Korea.  Shocking, right?  Probably not to anyone routinely traveling with two young children.  I managed to make tea most of the mornings but it was rushed work, not the right time for breaking out the most interesting teas.

I will write more of my impressions in more standard review posts.